Sunday, August 5, 2012

Making limoncello & Giardiniera

This weekend we were very productive in the kitchen. We've started the process to make limoncello and giardiniera. To top it all off we used the extra lemons to make a lemon sorbet.

It seems like all or nothing in our house!

Making limoncello is a regular activity in our home. Every 3-4
months we make a new batch - part for us, part for my in-laws who
are always eager to get us to make more whenever their bottle finishes
and also more for friends. It's very easy to create limoncello, it just
takes time to change alcohol and lemons into a nice velvety lemon digestif.

Here's the recipe if you're interested in trying it out yourself. Don't be afraid to try it out, it's very easy and the result is delicious.

While my boyfriend was mixing lemon peel with alcohol I was cutting and slicing a whole lot of vegetables to go into the giardiniera mixture. Giardiera is a mix of vegetables which are pickled which are great to mix in salads. I got the recipe from my mum but I decided to add some spiciness to it and bought a couple of Adjuma peppers which are exceptionally hot.

Usually I ask my boyfriend to cut hot peppers since sometimes after cutting peppers it hurts to remove my lenses. This time round I did the job myself and half an hour later I was nearly crying with pain. My hands were burning. I used all types of possible cures to reduce the burning but what worked was placing my hands in a water and ice mix all the evening. I even went to bed with a bowl of cold water. Now I'm afraid that the giardiniera will be too hot for me to eat seeing the effects of the peppers on my hands! Will have to wait a week to know.

This is the results of our work. The limoncello will more than double in amount next week once we add sugar and water to it.

You need 94% alcohol (or vodka if you cannot find it) to make limoncello. I guess drinking the liquid from this bottle will kills you.